Melanie Müller brings Hitler salute: This is the explanation of the Ballermann singer

“Always do these moves”
Melanie Müller explains the Hitler salute

30/09/2022, 09:48 (updated)

A video shows Melanie Müller surrounded by fans shouting “Sieg Heil”, now a second clip appears in which she herself shows the Nazi salute. The police are investigating. Meanwhile, the Ballermann singer states that she has nothing to do with right-wing extremists and tries to explain it.

It was only Tuesday that Melanie Müller stated via Instagram that she did not want to perform in Dresden tonight due to a recently published video, when the following compromising clip appeared. Initially, only fans of the Ballermann singer could be seen, who gave the Hitler salute and shouted “Sieg Heil”, now it is she herself who stretches her right arm several times.

Investigating authorities are now also interested in the material: “We are aware of the new video, so we have expanded our investigation,” a spokeswoman for the Leipzig state police said on Wednesday evening. “It concerns the charge of using signs of unconstitutional organizations under paragraph 86a of the Criminal Code.” Such features may include flags, insignia, uniform pieces, slogans, and forms of greeting.

In the 16-second video, which was reportedly sent directly to the newspaper “Bild”, the ex-jungle queen is on stage in front of the alleged right-wing extremists. First she still has the microphone in her right hand, then she interprets a battle cry from the Leipzig football scene with “Ost, Ost, Ostdeutschland”, according to the newspaper. Finally, Müller takes the microphone in his left hand as he continues to sing with the fans. The 34-year-old is said to have raised her outstretched right arm a total of eight times in a Nazi salute.

Club known to the Bureau for the Protection of the Constitution

At first it was said that the party where the first video was shot was a private birthday party, but it’s now clear that it took place in a bar home to rocker club “Rowdys Eastside”. The newspaper “Bild” quotes a spokeswoman for the Saxon Bureau for the Protection of the Constitution: “We know that persons from the extreme right-wing hooligan scene in Leipzig maintain contacts there.”

She has “nothing to do with right-wing radicals or nationalist ideas,” Müller said in a statement on Instagram that evening. And she was “stricken physically and mentally” by the claim that she was in a right-wing environment. The singer tried to explain her gestures to the newspaper “Bild” in the evening as follows: “I have been on stage for eleven years and always make those hand movements. Not from right-wing extremist background, but ‘Zicke zacke zicke zacke’ , so exactly the way I do it there”.

In fact, Müller shouts out the well-known carnivalist and sportsman’s battle cry “Zicke zacke zicke zacke hoi hoi hoi” during her performances. According to the observations of the newspaper “Bild”, but usually without a deceptive arm movement. Instead, she usually keeps her microphone in the audience, the paper writes.

Müller’s partner Andreas Kunz already responded to the accusations on Tuesday: “Depending on the perspective from which a video or photo is taken, it can of course quickly appear as if it is the Nazi salute when the crowd warms up. That has even happened to Angela Merkel.”

Kunze, however, should not be a blank slate in the neo-Nazi scene. According to research by RTL, he has “a wide corporate network. Part of it can be assigned to very shady companies. For example, the security company Asgaard, which has repeatedly drawn attention to extreme right-wing activities”. He and Müller also visit the SinCity BoxGym, “which we know belongs to the extreme right-wing extremist scene in Leipzig. Everyone who associates with such people is deeply rooted in this scene,” continues RTL. But Müller doesn’t want to know about it, at least not exactly: “I’m not right-wing organized – I don’t know, I have no idea, was I ever that?” She told “Bild” newspaper.

(This article was first published on Thursday, September 29, 2022.)